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226 • THE AUSTRALIAN LOCAL GOVERNMENT YEARBOOK EDITION 24
HEALTH + SAFETY
public health approach to manage the long-term illicit drug
problems in some problematic areas. The council resolution
requested a supervised injecting facility and named a location.
The mayor noted that residents and traders had endured the
consequences of illicit drug problems for too many years, and
personally supported supervised injecting facilities, noting the
role that they play in supervising drug users and saving lives.
Several years earlier, the councils of Australia's capital cities had
supported more pragmatic approaches to the nation's growing
drug problem. These councils pointed out that drug use has a
considerable impact on local government.
For many decades, governments in most countries have
relied on ever-more punishment, and even greater reliance on
tougher law-enforcement strategies to control drug problems.
But it is now clear to a growing number of people that the
'war on drugs' approach has manifestly failed. In 2014, then
Prime Minister Tony Abbott acknowledged that '[the war on
drugs] is ... not a war we will ever finally win. The war on drugs
is a war you can lose'. Several retired and serving state police
commissioners have accepted publicly that 'we cannot arrest
and imprison our way out of our illicit drug problems'.
In May 2001, the Medically Supervised Injecting Centre
was opened in Sydney's Kings Cross after a long and bruising
battle. Run as part of the Uniting Church, the centre has been an
outstanding success. A dozen or more independent evaluations
of the centre found impressive evidence of its substantial
benefits. None found any convincing evidence of important
adverse effects. Studies of the Medically Supervised Injecting
Centre and several other drug consumption rooms found that
they saved more money than they cost to run. The Medically
Supervised Injecting Centre has always enjoyed overwhelming
local support from residents, businesses and police. Yet,
despite 16 successful years of operation, it is still the only drug
consumption room in Australia. During those 16 years, Australian
governments have continued to generously fund drug law
enforcement with only minimal evidence of benefit and much
evidence of serious unintended negative consequences.
What we are now seeing in Australia is a slow but relentless
retreat from the war on drugs. This trend has already been
observable in many other countries for some years. There is
a growing recognition that the war on drugs has been an
expensive and counterproductive exercise that has failed
to combat an expanding and more dangerous drug market
and the ever-increasing deaths, disease, crime, corruption
and violence. What is needed is a more pragmatic and less
ideological response to the drug problem. It is not drug use
per se that should be the target of drug policy, but rather the
harm that drugs and drug policies produce. We should aim to
reintegrate back into the community the people who use drugs
and struggle with drug problems, helping them to lead normal
and useful lives. The key step that's needed is to redefine drugs
as primarily a health and social problem, rather than a criminal
justice issue.
Many people have visited the Uniting Medically Supervised
Injecting Centre in Kings Cross to see how the centre works and
what it achieves. The overwhelming majority of these people
leave enormously impressed by the great work that the centre
does, and are moved by the dedication and commitment of the
wonderful staff. After Jeff Kennett, former Premier of Victoria,
visited the centre, he wrote glowing articles in the Melbourne
media about his visit. Critics claim that drug consumption
rooms 'send the wrong message', but they haven't been able to
produce any evidence to support their claims.
Australia probably needs at least a dozen or so drug
consumption rooms. These drug consumption rooms are not
needed in all suburbs, but they are required in those parts of the
country where a large drug market adversely affects local residents
and businesses, and where the local community and police strongly
support opening such a centre.
We should fully respect the human rights of people who use
drugs, and we must focus on improving their health and wellbeing
while also being mindful of the need to provide relief to their
families and communities. Most clients visiting drug consumption
rooms have appalling physical and mental health, are very isolated,
are often homeless, and rarely attend any other health or social
facility. Their conditions are much worse than those of an average
person using drugs. Attracting people who use drugs to attend
drug consumption rooms is often the start of a difficult but
rewarding process of reintegration into the community.
In 2016, some of us (myself; Matt Noffs, Chief Executive of the Ted
Noffs Foundation; and Eamonn Duff, senior investigative writer)
visited drug consumption rooms in Bern, Frankfurt and Berlin, where
it became startlingly obvious how far Australia now lags behind
the world's best practice. Local government has been instrumental
in establishing most of the drug consumption rooms in Europe,
with strong support from the community and local police. Yet,
these benefits are denied to most people who use drugs in most
communities in Australia.
For more information, contact Dr Alex Wodak AM,
President, Australian Drug Law Reform Foundation.
21 Darlinghurst, NSW, 2010
alex.wodak@gmail.com
0416 143 823